the tree in my path
Imagine a quiet, serene forest with a canopy of trees where the only sounds are those of songbirds like the elusive wood thrush or the blue warbler and the low chatter of bugs and little foraging critters. The sun is just peeking through the trees and casting swords of light here and there as if greedily seeking something to impale and return to the sky with.
This is my ideal path - if I could walk on this path of serenity, peace and beauty forever, I would, and never look back. There are no obstacles on my ideal path.
But sometimes life has different plans.
This year, 2020, has been a big tree in my path. I had a clear vision of how this past year was going to go - teach a summer festival in Europe, travel to Vienna (which is a big bucket-list item for me), travel and tour Russia with a new brass quintet...and some other exciting things that are maybe less glamorous but still important...family vacations, local gigs, concerts...
Instead this year's path had a big thorny, angry tree that cut and wounded me with the pandemic, grieving the decision to quit a long-time summer festival, numerous family health and emotional trials, and most painful of all, the suicide of a good friend of 20 years. I am still tending the wounds caused by this thorny tree in my path and will have scars to show for it.
What about you? What is your ideal path? It could be a lazy river and you're in a canoe, it could be a moss-bed trail with lush thick forests, it could be long winding road through the mountains in a convertible with the top open and wind on your face.
If you are on your path and there is an obstacle, something blocking the flow of your path, you have to figure out a way through it or around it. If there is huge fallen tree on your moss-bed trail in the forest, you can stop and stare at the tree but you'd be giving all of your focus and energy to the problem, not the solution.
Focusing solely on the obstacle won't help you get around it.
You have to figure out where your feet are going to step next and what you'll need to do to get past the tree. Here is another way to look at it...
One valuable lesson when learning how to kayak in a river is to never focus on the rock in the path of the water as you paddle. If you do as it gets closer and closer, odds are that you will run right into it. Problems in life are like the rock. Problems and obstacles loom and grow until you either run into them and get ensnared and broken, or you focus on a solution - a way around and past.
You are taught in kayaking that you must fix your eyes on either side of the rock, and the flow of water around the rock. You are aware of the rock, and that you need to steer clear. The rock is changing the flow of water, but not stopping it. The water will find a way around - with you in its flow. But you must point your boat and efforts towards the flow, not the rock.
I think there is a valuable lesson here. This is very analogous with life. How can you think about your own rocks or trees that are in the way? Are you stuck contemplating the obstacle? Or are you focused on the flow and beyond? I find focusing on the obstacle (read:pain) can be paralyzing.
Confession: I am tangled up in the tree on my path. I have lost my footing, slipped, contemplated building a dwelling in the tree and just living there.
But my life would be wrought with thorns and tangles. The wounds would never heal and add to new ones. I would be stuck. It will be hard, but I want to get back to my path. I don't want to be stuck in the tree.
No matter what, the sun rises again, the tree eventually stagnates, disintegrates and goes back into the earth. The tree rots and fades away. No matter what, the water will find a way around the rock.
If I stay in the tree, I'll stagnate too.
Sometimes moving beyond the obstacle is SO difficult...it's all you can focus on because it's all you can see. And it can be hard because there is no easy footing or obvious way around. Sometimes it slows life down.
But, I promise you, there is beauty and life on the other side. There is more path. That tricky climb you just made will prepare you better for the next one. It will look different, not exactly the same, but you'll be more ready.
What am I doing about the tree in my path? Well, it turns out that TIME really is a healer of wounds, that there are ways to celebrate the life of a friend even though it is very hard, that Vienna hasn't gone anywhere, that the brass quintet is going to Belgium instead, that hopefully we will all get past our trials, and that grieving the losses of 2020 is a normal process.
I see the sun rising on 2021. I don't know what obstacles are coming, but I am planning on forging ahead with my scars despite the rocks and trees.
